Huajuapan Regional Museum

Cultural museum in the northwestern Mexican state of Oaxaca, the museum is intended to display archaeological finds from different historical sites of the Mixtec community.

Huajuapan Regional Museum
Photo by Jesús Romero
Type:	Cultural Museum
Country:	Mexico
Establishment:	1997

The Huajuapan Regional Museum (Spanish: Museo Regional de Huajuapan) is a cultural museum in the northwestern Mexican state of Oaxaca, the museum is intended to display archaeological finds from different historical sites of the Mixtec community.

History

In 1999, the regional museum was established in the city of Huajuapan, with the objective of storing archaeological objects from different sites in the Mixteca Baja.^[1] The museum had to close temporarily after the Puebla earthquake of 2017, after the temporary repair of some of the exhibits and part of the structure of the museum, art exhibitions were subsequently held in the museum with pieces by different native artists of Oaxaca as is Francisco Toledo.^[2]

Collections

The museum presents aerophones found in the Cerro de las Minas, an aerophone is a wind musical instrument, these artifacts were made of ceramic and were intended to produce sounds through the vibration of air, to make the aerophones have a spherical or tubular chamber that stores air to generate the sound.^[3]

Additionally, the museum has stone tombstones and stelae with inscriptions of the ñuine script, these artifacts were used in the construction of religious buildings, developed by Mixtec communities identified in the northwestern part of Oaxaca and southwestern Puebla.^[4]

In October 2022, the museum held an exhibition about Tapetes de Arena, a type of art from the Central Valleys of Oaxaca, used to commemorate the death of a family member by modeling the sand through the use of water and pigments.^[5]

Additionally, the museum has received archaeological donations found in different municipalities in Oaxaca, such as effigy vessels and urns of ñuine style found in San Miguel Tlacotepec.^[6]

References

1. Gonzalez, V. M. J. (2014). Oaxaca, Monte Alban, Puerto Escondido, Bahías de Huatulco, Guía de Viaje: Todo el Estado de Oaxaca (México). Solaris Comunicación. (Page 105) (in Spanish)

2. Guevara, F. (2020-01-21). El Museo Regional de Huajuapan, espacio cultural y referente de la Mixteca. El Imparcial (Oaxaca). (in Spanish)

3. Santiago, G. A. S. (2009). Figurillas y aerófonos de cerámica de Cerro de las Minas. Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia. ISBN: 978-607-00-1109-2 (Page 11 & 51) (in Spanish)

4. Rodríguez, L. (2022-09-17). El sistema de escritura ñuiñe: Avances y retos - Ichan Tecolotl. Ichan Tecolotl (Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores En Antropología Social). (in Spanish)

5. Reviven tradición de muertos con exposición de tapetes de arena en el MureH. (2022-10-28). SRI - Sistema Radiofónico Informativo. (in Spanish)

6. Barabas, A., Bartolomé, M., Castillo, M. del C., Millán, S., Sittón, S. N. y, Bartolomé, M. A., Sigüenza, S., Berrojalbiz, F., Peña, I., Maldonado, B., Castillo, M. del C., Sánchez, L. P., Espinoza, A., López-Rosas, C., Amaya-Corchuelo, S., Reyes, D., López, S., González-Licón, E., Márquez, L., & Granados, G. (2020). Patrimonio cultural de Oaxaca: Investigaciones recientes. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia. ISBN: 978-607-539-313-1 (Page 282) (in Spanish)